


Chance Meetings

by Gray Cardinal (Gray_Cardinal)



Series: Never What They Seem [3]
Category: Castle, Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crossover, Gen, Podfic Available
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-07
Updated: 2015-05-07
Packaged: 2018-03-29 09:39:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3891514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gray_Cardinal/pseuds/Gray%20Cardinal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of the five men in Manhattan most likely to be working for HYDRA has just left a brewpub in Morningside Heights.</p>
<p>Now that he's gone, it's time for the story to start....</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chance Meetings

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** _Pepper Potts and the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe belong to, well, Marvel. Alexis Castle, the spy formerly known as Jackson Hunt, and the rest of the Castleverse belong to ABC (and in some measure to Andrew Marlowe, who created them). And both Marvel and ABC are owned by Disney (which is now in charge of a scary number of fictional universes, but we’re getting sidetracked here). Disney has not, however, had anything to do with the following adventure, which is probably just as well._
> 
> **Chronology:** _The events herein take place early in Season 7 of_ Castle _, and some time after the events of_ Captain America: The Winter Soldier _. The abilities Pepper displays represent sheer speculation on my part as to the aftermath of_ Iron Man 3 _. With any luck,_ Age of Ultron _won’t Joss any of the following too severely._
> 
> **Notes:** _Sometimes the plot bunnies arrive like animated cartoon anvils. While this story stands more or less on its own, it also serves as a sequel to my earlier “Spy Stories” (an episode tag to the Season 5_ Castle _episodes chronicling Alexis’ kidnapping), and precedes the events of “Professional Relationships”, in which Alexis tells Castle about her new job._
> 
> _Also, my sincere and delighted thanks to[malnpudl](http://archiveofourown.org/users/malnpudl) for joining in on this round of "Into A Bar" and recording the podfic version of this story. The collaboration was an entirely seamless and pleasant experience, and there is a distinct possibility of further developments in this direction._

**New York City • A brewpub in Morningside Heights**

“Damn,” Pepper Potts said, so softly that her lips barely moved. “Did that girl just pull off what I think she did?”

“Unknown, ma’am,” said JARVIS’ voice into her ear, “as our present interface lacks telepathic capability. However, if you refer to her successful acquisition of a glass recently handled by ‘Nicholas Rook’ without that gentleman’s knowledge, then your perception is indeed correct.”

“In other words, _yes_.” Pepper stood up, crossing rapidly from her rear-corner booth to intercept the girl in question just before she reached the pub’s front entrance. “That was impressive work,” Pepper told the girl, a willowy redhead who looked barely old enough to be in the bar legally. “But I don’t see what good it will do you. There isn’t a database on the planet you can trust to give you the straight story where he’s concerned – or an accurate fingerprint match, for that matter. Trust me, we looked.”

The girl let out an unexpected laugh, gave Pepper a quick visual once-over, and then spoke a single word. “We?”

Pepper returned the studied glance. “Not the government, if that’s what you’re thinking – but I promise I’m a white hat. If you have a moment to talk, we could compare notes.”

“Done.” As Pepper led the way back to her booth, her companion paused to address the bartender. “Becca, better get me a fresh root beer – and a bowl of baseballs. I think this may take awhile.”

“Baseballs?” Admittedly, Pepper had paid minimal attention to the pub’s food menu, but she was sure she’d have remembered seeing that item.

“Daily special. I’ll share, I promise – oh, unless you’re vegetarian.”

Pepper shook her head. “Dedicated omnivore. Now, then,” she went on, as they seated themselves facing one another, “suppose we start with our mutual subject of interest. Just how much do you know about him?”

“Too much and not enough,” came the prompt reply. “He said he was CIA – and the first time around, the embassy people backed him up. The second time was a lot fuzzier – his paper trail said he’d quit and gone rogue, but he claimed he was just deep undercover. And of course the only names we ever got were cover IDs.”

“Of course,” Pepper agreed. “Clive Malone, Anderson Cross, David James Ryan, and so on. For what it’s worth, this month he’s calling himself Nicholas Rook.”

Pepper barely managed to dodge the ensuing spray of root beer as her booth-mate’s mouth went wide. “ _Nicholas Rook_?” the girl echoed once she’d recovered her breath. “That’s...oh, God. I don’t know if it’s creepy or just plain weird.”

Pepper gave her a sharp look. “I take it that name is significant.”

“Of course it is,” the girl said indignantly. “Haven’t you – oh, wait, I’m an idiot. I’m Alexis,” she said, “and my dad is Richard Castle.”

“Writer of mysteries and thrillers,” JARVIS put in helpfully, his voice soft but distinct in Pepper’s ear.

Pepper was already nodding. “So Rook, after Jameson Rook, and possibly Nicholas after Nikki Heat. And probably not just picked out of a hat – or off a bestseller list. Am I right?”

Meanwhile, JARVIS was speaking again. “Identity confirmed. Also, there is a prior connection between Miss Castle and Mr. Rook – an abduction from which he was partially responsible for her rescue. I have forwarded a summary to your tablet.”

“Definitely not picked out of a hat,” Alexis said. “We’ve both – my dad and I, I mean – got history with, well, whoever he is, and he’s got...leverage with Dad. Only it’s phony leverage, and this—” she tapped the white foam takeout box with Rook’s beer glass in it – “ought to prove it.”

“I’m not so sure,” Pepper replied, “but before we get to that, you need to know just how much hot water you’ve jumped into. Rook’s CIA history is just the tip of the iceberg. Suppose I told you – um, better put that glass down first – that he’s one of the five men in Manhattan most likely to be working for HYDRA.”

Alexis’ face lost some of its color, and she whistled softly. “Whoa. Also, _eep_. That would be the HYDRA with the secret let’s-rule-the-world agenda that kind of blew up S.H.I.E.L.D. last year?”

“Not so secret these days,” Pepper said wryly. “Scary thing: most of what the tabloids have printed about HYDRA since then is pretty much true. The mainstream news outlets, not so much. And it turns out that at least half of Rook’s handlers, going back better than twenty years, are either HYDRA or have HYDRA connections.”

“And you know this how? Especially if there isn’t a database on the planet with straight answers.”

In Pepper’s ear, JARVIS sounded amused. “A fair question, ma’am. I have been examining Miss Castle’s background, and all available evidence indicates that she is entirely trustworthy. I believe full disclosure would be appropriate.”

Pepper’s eyebrows rose; the statement was one JARVIS wouldn’t make lightly. She glanced out into the pub. A few other customers dotted the room, but most were preoccupied with books, laptops, or their companions.   She took a deep breath. “Okay, put down the root beer again first. Also? No loud noises, please. You _will_ want to make one, but we don’t need the attention right now.”

Alexis nodded, drawing a finger across her lips.

Pepper took another breath, then closed her eyes, flipped the necessary mental switch, and opened them again. In response, her hair shifted from brunette to cinnamon to its proper blonde, her skin likewise resumed its normal tone, and – most unsettling from her own perspective – her eyes, nose, and cheekbones subtly reshaped themselves into the contours they usually bore.

On the opposite side of the booth, Alexis’ face was doing a credible impression of an anime character bug-out. However, she was – just barely – complying with Pepper’s admonition not to squeal, and after two or three deep breaths of her own, the younger girl seemed to have gotten hold of herself. Then she took a good look at her no-longer-disguised table-mate, blinked, and said, “Wait a second, I’ve seen you on TV. You’re—”

“Pepper Potts, at your service,” said Pepper. “When I said _we looked_ , that was _we_ as in Stark Industries. For very specific values of _we_ , mind you – there are maybe half a dozen people with security clearances high enough to know about it. And only four of them have seen what you just did,” she added.

“Understood.” Alexis said gravely. “That said – if it’s not even more top secret, how did you do that?”

Pepper was quiet for a moment. Then she leaned forward, her arms folded in front of her on the table. “We have something in common,” she said, flipping her tablet over so Alexis could read JARVIS’ notes. “I was kidnapped myself awhile back – actually, pretty close to the same time you were. Only in my case, I ended up playing guinea pig for a mad-scientist project, and came about _that_ far from turning into a human Dungeons-and-Dragons fireball.” She held up a thumb and fingertip held a hair’s breadth apart. “Luckily, (a) I avoided actually exploding by about three tenths of a second, and (b) Tony worked out a way to stabilize the effect.”

“Ouch.” Alexis’ tone was soft. “I take it there were side effects.”

“More like ongoing consequences,” Pepper said. “But yes. The experiment basically turned me atom by atom into energy, and the effect isn’t fully reversible. The fix was to inject me with a whole swarm of nanobots that literally hold me together. It works just fine – but the programming is flexible enough that I can pretty much look like anyone I want to. And what with all that built-in processing power,” she added wryly, “I’m also my own wi-fi hotspot and cell tower.”

“An extreme oversimplification,” said JARVIS, sounding slightly offended.

“Oh, be quiet,” Pepper told him. “Not you,” she added to Alexis. “The voices in my head are acting up.”

JARVIS favored her with an electronic snort, and Alexis chuckled. “You might want to change back,” she said. “Becca’s on her way over, and if she sees the real you –”

“Right.”

In a matter of seconds Pepper’s appearance returned to its earlier disguised state, just in time for the bartender to set a fresh root beer in front of Alexis, and a platter-sized serving bowl and two ramekins of dipping sauce in the center of the table. “Something else for you?” she asked Pepper.

“Pint of the golden cider – I think I’m going to need it. Oh, and put all this on my tab.”

“Done and done,” the bartender said cheerfully. “Enjoy.”

“Baseballs, I presume?” Pepper asked as Alexis plucked the topmost from the heaping mound in the bowl. In fact, they were closer in size to golf balls, and looked very much like golden-brown spherical biscuits. She picked one up and bit it in two, discovering in the process that the tender pastry coating was barely more than paper-thin and that what it surrounded was a tasty, mildly spiced meatball. “Nice. And not greasy at all.”

“Addictive,” Alexis said. “And baked, so the health police can’t complain. Now where were we?”

Pepper finished her first baseball, picked up another, and frowned slightly. “Puzzled. My people thought Rook had come to town to go after...some assets we’ve recently acquired. His file says he stops in here whenever he’s in Manhattan, so I thought I might catch him making contact with someone about that. Instead, I spent an hour watching the two of you tap-dance around each other. Very skillfully, I might add.”

Alexis shrugged. “He does that. It’s his way of keeping Dad on his leash.”

“Which you’re hoping to unhook,” Pepper observed, “with that glass. Though I still don’t see how; there’s no trustworthy data out there to be matched with whatever test results you’d get.”

“There doesn’t need to be,” said Alexis. “I don’t care who ‘Nicholas Rook’ really is. All I have to do is prove who he’s not.”

It was Pepper’s turn to blink at Alexis in astonishment. “Oh. My. God,” she said as the dominoes fell over in her head. “He actually played the – I suppose it would be the grandfather card? And got away with it?”

Alexis nodded. “Bingo. He turned up in Paris after I was kidnapped, convinced Dad he was his father, then set up a rescue. We only worked out later that he pretty much had to have engineered the kidnapping in the first place. Then he showed up again a few months ago, right here in New York – but that situation was crazy enough that Dad and Grams couldn’t call his bluff. I wasn’t actually there for that one, but Dad says Grams should win about four Tonys for the performance she gave.”

“And his visits here?”

“All part of the con,” said Alexis. “He showed Dad a stalker-wall in Paris with pictures of me – like you said, playing the grandfather card. He claimed it was as close as he could get to us and still be a superspy. So now he’s got an excuse to do the stalker routine without getting too close, only now we know he’s a superspy, it’s okay if we see him doing it.”

“There’s no chance he really might be...?”

Alexis shook her head. “Grams says not, but she also says he makes an awfully convincing fake. I figure it’s way past time to make sure. Especially,” she added, “if he’s hooked up with HYDRA.”

“An excellent point,” Pepper said. “One question. Do you have a reliable source for the actual DNA test? I’d bet that with Rook’s connections, there’s a warning flag set to trigger if his particular DNA sample shows up anywhere in a commercial or government computer.”

“No bet.” Alexis’ tone was dry. “I’d figured on doing the tests myself, to be safe. I’ve got friends at the city morgue and the chem department at school, but if their lab computers aren’t secure, that might be a problem.”

Pepper gave Alexis a Cheshire-cat smile. “I think I can arrange an acceptable alternative. Assuming, of course, that you wouldn’t mind stopping by Stark Tower sometime this week.”

Alexis laughed out loud. “Oh, please,” she said, “don’t even think about throwing me in that briar patch. Thursday, one o’clock?”

“Done.” Pepper’s expression turned thoughtful. “You know, if you wanted to do something useful with your shiny new absurdly high security clearance, I just might have a job available once you’ve got your test results squared away. I think I mentioned some assets we found left over from Tony’s father’s era, that totally need to be organized and catalogued?”

“Tests first,” Alexis said, smiling. “Then we’ll talk.”

# # #

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Podfic: Chance Meetings by Gray Cardinal](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3892891) by [malnpudl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/malnpudl/pseuds/malnpudl)




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